Reggae? Sure. Gays? Nope.

In a new interview with the UK Guardian, Snoop Dogg dishes on a huge range of subjects: his metamorphosis into Snoop Lion, how many joints he smokes per day, and whether he'd ever consider going into politics. (Also, how to be a pimp and a married man at the same time.)

He even explains his thoughts on homosexuality in rap -- and why he doesn't think it will ever be accepted. Despite this skepticism, though, Snoop seems to understand the struggle for gay rights as basically analogous to the struggle for civil rights. From the story:

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Perhaps, as Morrissey once sang, "Sorry Doesn't Help" -- but the singer is going to try anyway. Acknowledging for the first time the six Bay Area concerts he's cancelled in a row, Morrissey today announced plans for a month-long live residency in San Francisco this summer.

"Dear San Francisco, I'm sorry ... I'm feeling better, and I'll do my best to play for you this time," the England-born, Los Angeles-based former Smiths singer said in a statement, alluding to his recent health problems. "We shall be together for a whole month -- as long as you keep the smell of burning animals away."

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The crowd Phoenix drew at Outside Lands in 2010 -- much larger than will fit inside the Independent.

Today, at about 11 a.m., the folks at the the Independent announced that French electro-rockers Phoenix will be playing the venue this Monday, April 1 -- and that the $45 tickets were going on sale at noon. Three years ago, Phoenix packed the Polo Fields at Golden Gate Park for a mid-afternoon set on the main stage of Outside Lands. So how fast did the band burn through the Independent's 500-person capacity?

"Instantly," says a spokesperson for Another Planet Entertainment, which manages the Independent. But how instantly? Live 105 Music Director Aaron Axelsen put the figure at 10 measly seconds. Which is rather more quickly than Dave Chappelle managed to sell out either the Independent or the Chapel for any of his four shows this week. (Chappelle, of course, also comes to the Bay Area way more often than Phoenix.)

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Everything you need to know about BrokeNCYDE is contained in the above photo.

Even awful bands do things right sometimes. We're wholly disinclined to say anything nice about the "crunk-core" cartoon outfit BrokeNCYDE, because, well, BrokeNCYDE is terrible. They're so terrible that after receiving a CD in the mail boldly entitled The Best of BrokeNCYDE, we actually rolled around on the floor laughing, showed it to everyone in our office, watched them roll on the floor laughing, giggled some more, then Tweeted about it.

But! Said CD came accompanied with a press release, as CDs mailed to newspapers often do. Most CD press releases are as mediocre as room-temp turkey on Dec. 2. This was a very un-mediocre CD press release, however. In fact it may be the single greatest CD press release we have ever received -- an honor we are extremely hesitant to bestow upon anyone, much less the patron saints of late-adolescent binge-drinking idiocy. But this press release was short, well-written, and funny. It got our attention, and prompted us to consider writing about the band. Unfortunately, there isn't much of a lesson here for you music PR folks, because this kind of thing can only be done once:

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Bike parking at Hardly Strictly: Crowded, yes, but still your best bet for getting around this weekend.

Everyone, don't even think of bringing your motor-powered metal sled to San Francisco this weekend for the Hardly Strictly Bluegrass festival. Just please don't. Because not only is Hardly Strictly going to draw untold thousands of people to Golden Gate Park, but there are about nine major events happening in the city on Saturday and Sunday. More than a million people are coming here, officials estimate. Meaning every car-width paved surface in the city is going to become an exhaust-clogged purgatory, a still life of indian-summer shittiness to which you should not contribute. Just look at what's going on:

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The censored version of Death Grips' new album artwork.

Well, well: Anarchic Sacramento rap outfit Death Grips posted all of its new album, NO LOVE DEEP WEB, online for free this morning -- allegedly before reps for its label, Epic, even had a chance to hear it. Several hours later, the label apparently responded by shutting down the band's website, Pitchfork reports.

our sight just got shut down- BASIC AS FUCK

— Death Grips (@DeathGripz) October 1, 2012

Which -- along with this NSFW-and-most-definitely-not-safe-for-marketing-anywhere new cover artwork, really kind of makes us wonder what a group like Death Grips is doing on a major label, anyway.

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The Tosca. Swoon.

When you want to hear classic opera played on vinyl from an old-school jukebox, while drinking old-school cocktails, there's only once place to go in San Francisco: the Tosca Cafe.

The North Beach watering hole is a haven of class, with tuxedoed bartenders, table service, red vinyl booths, and a 100-percent opera jukebox. Famous clientele of the 92-year-old bar include just about any big name that's ever come through San Francisco: Francis Ford Coppola (a local), Sean Penn, Hunter S. Thompson, Ed Harris, and many more.

But according to Chronicle columnist Chuck Nevius, the bar's landlord is threatening to make the next piece heard in the Tosca a fat lady singing.

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Blur's Damon Albarn

Today, Blur frontman Damon Albarn concerns himself with 16th-century alchemists, playing music in the aisles of speeding commuter trains, and how obnoxious those 2012 Olympic bed linen sets and pictogram aprons truly are. We here in the States know what it's like to be the center of Albarn's unwavering attention. During the 1990s, when Blur was at its creative apex, Albarn's lyrics and interviews endorsed an outright rejection of U.S. pop culture while advocating for a particular brand of Britishness.

Albarn loathed the mere idea of America. He loathed the fact that a place like America actually existed. He loathed the reality that America was just too ... American. He trotted out a clever term for what ails our country: bubble culture. "People feeling content," Albarn explained, "in these huge domes that have one temperature and are filled with lobotomized music." (Years later, Blur's "Song 2" would become an anthemic staple in temperature-controlled, domed sports stadiums across the U.S.)

So in honor of today's release of the mammoth, career retrospective Blur 21 -- a box set featuring all seven of the band's studio albums, four discs of rarities, three DVDs of unreleased footage, a collectible seven-inch record, and a book -- we have compiled a list of the songwriter's most acerbic lyrical digs at the U.S.

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Pearl Jam performing at S.F.'s Outside Lands festival in 2009.

Bad news for better men: the Novato-based former financial manager for Pearl Jam is accused of stealing $380,000 from the Seattle grunge titans, according to the Chron.

The man, 54-year-old Rickey Charles Goodrich, paid his own credit card bills, took vacations, and bought fancy wine on the band's dime, in what amounts to 33 counts of theft, according to prosecutors in King County, Wash.

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Dear Madonna,

We'd like to preface this by saying that we've always been huge fans. Your "Like A Virgin" video blew our tiny minds as children; "Papa Don't Preach" is still one of our favorite songs of all time; and the entire Like A Prayer album is genius (thanks for helping out, Prince). When Ray of Light came out, we were like "Wow! This woman is going to be relevant and cutting edge forever!"

Recently, though, we've started to wonder if we were wrong about that. Sure, your Super Bowl performance was hugely entertaining (aside from those awful LMFAO people being involved -- who deemed that necessary?), but lately you seem to have developed an air of desperation. We're starting to worry about you.

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